


Confidences

by extremelyperturbed



Category: Doctor Strange (2016)
Genre: Comedy, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-27
Updated: 2016-11-27
Packaged: 2018-09-02 15:30:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8672737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/extremelyperturbed/pseuds/extremelyperturbed
Summary: Levi, the Cloak of Levitation, asks Christine a favor.  It's a sequel to Commiseration.





	

Christine sighed. This was the last episode of the season for Sherlock, perhaps the series. At least she had baked goodies from Levi to help soothe the pain.

The doorbell ringed. Levi was floating with a plate of white chocolate macadamia cookies. 

"Oh, my favorite," said Christine as she let the Cloak of Levitation in. She suddenly realized that with the last episode of Sherlock, she might not be visited by Levi any more and that made her even sadder. "How is Stephen?"

"Oh, he's trying some new spell combination. Everybody has decided to take cover until he's done tweaking it."

"Oh, dear."

"How has the ER been?"

"Fortunately, on the quiet side. Mostly children with high fevers and a broken arm from a skateboarding trick gone wrong." 

"I'm glad nobody died."

***

"You can't end like that when it might be the last episode ever!" yelled Christine at the screen.

"Boo!" wrote Levi. 

Christine sighed as she bit into a cookie. 

"I've got a favor to ask you," wrote Levi.

"What kind of favor?" said Christine. She couldn't think what she could do for Levi that Stephen or Wong couldn't.

"Could you teach me medicine?"

"Medicine?"

"As you once pointed out, Stephen's not exactly teacher material. Also, he's liable to get injured. I want to keep him alive until I can get him to you."

"I can't teach you all that in an hour."

"That's fine. I can come here for a few hours a week and read at home the rest of the time."

"Oh," said Christine.

"I will come by with more cookies."

***

"I think that what I need to know is how much you know about medicine so we don't go over things you already know. I'm also guessing that there are a lot of things you learned about the body through magic." She would have felt a little more happy if a paramedic or a certified instructor was giving this particular instruction but it wasn't like Levi had many choices when it came to teachers willing to give lessons to a magical cloak.

"I do know many recipes for healing potions. Unfortunately, for the great majority, the ingredients are either extinct or quite rare. I shall write down the ones with common ingredients. I also know how to form a tourniquet to stop bleeding after an amputation."

"Hmm," said Christine. "I think I'll teach you about basic First Aid first. I also managed to get a friend of mine to let me borrow her CPR dummy."

Levi clapped.

"Do you have a first aid kit where you live?"

"I'll have to check. I'll ask him to get one if we don't."

"I'm going to assume that the person you'll be treating will be Stephen but this can be used for anybody as well. Stephen may be many things but he takes infection seriously so when he gets a cut and he starts to get a fever, he knows to come in for a look see. Let's say Wong gets a wound that won't stop bleeding despite you applying pressure and Stephen's not available, take him to the hospital or get him to call 911 or the local version of it. If the wound is deep or caused by something dirty or something bit him, he might need a tetanus shot or a rabies shot or in the event of a snake bite, an anti-venom shot. If you see any sign of fever or pus or inflammation, don't let that person talk you into letting them tough it out, come in."

Levi nodded. 

"What first aid is about is giving the victim more time to get to an ER or someone who can help him. The first thing you should know is this: you can't fuck up worse than death. If the choice is between a dead person and someone with broken ribs or a pierced organ, go for the living person. We can fix injuries but we can't fix death.

"Since you can't call 911, try to get someone else to call 911. If Stephen is severely injured but in a very dangerous area like an assailant or a monster is seconds away from killing him, you can risk getting him out of there to somewhere safe. If he's in a safe place, try not to move him as moving him may cause further injury. If he seems unconscious, try to rouse him by making a loud noise and give him a shake. If he wakes up, get him to tell him what's wrong and where it hurts and what happened. If he's unconscious, check to see if he is breathing. Can you feel his breath? Is his chest moving? Do he have a pulse? If the answer is no . . . 

At this point, Christine showed Levi the CPR dummy. "Due to the fact that you don't seem to have the ability to breathe into Stephen's mouth, I'm going to focus on mainly chest compression. The compressions will keep blood flowing and send oxygen to the brain for the first few minutes after a cardiac arrest. This will keep him alive." Christine showed Levi how to apply the compression to the chest and at what rhythm. "If a paramedic arrives on the scene, let him or her take over."

Christine had Levi demonstrate the technique until she was satisfied Levi had gotten it. She couldn't help but smile to see the cloak give the CPR dummy chest compressions.

"I hope you never have to do this. A few tips. If it's not magic, don't pull out a spear or a knife or arrow that penetrates his body as that will likely cause the victim to bleed to death. Leave it to a professional to take it out.

"A good thing to remember is the Heimlich manuever. If someone gets something stuck in their throat to the point they can't breathe or speak after you ask if they're OK, do NOT pound on their back, it'll just make things worse. Stand behind them, put your . . . press their abdomen inwards and upwards forcefully to get them to cough out whatever's blocking their windpipe. Do this multiple times until they cough up whatever the obstruction is. If it doesn't work and the victim passes out, call 911." Christine showed Levi a video on her laptop demonstrating how to do this.

Levi nodded. 

"Do you want me to write this all down?' said Christine, noticing that Levi wasn't taking any notes. 

"No, my memory is like Stephen's," Levi wrote, referring to Stephen's photographic memory.

"Oh, that's very useful." Christine often envied Stephen's ability to memorize things easily. She remember spending hours with flashcards to brute force it all into her head. 

Levi wrote, "I remember in the olden days, people thought that diseases were caused by evil spirits and curses. There was also excessive bloodletting and it was hard to get people to wash their hands when doing surgery or touching wounds. Some of the herbal potions worked but nobody knew why they worked. The one thing I am most grateful for is anesthesia. Opium wasn't always available."

"Yeah, I've read about those times. While there were midwives and healers, I wouldn't have been formally allowed to be a doctor. Surgery was often done by a barber." Christine shivers at how bleak the state of medicine was back then. "I thought magic could fix everything."

"While there were many quacks who claimed to have magical powers, magic isn't that common and high level abilities is rarer still. The Ancient One lived for hundreds of years but had to use energy from the Dark Dimension, which could have corrupted her. I have seen people use magic to power their formerly paralyzed bodies and regain feeling. But for something that can be given to everyone on a mass scale, I think science is the way to go. The number of doctors will always vastly out number magicians. And I say this as an entity made of magic."

Christine smiled at that.

***

Christine was making spaghetti sauce at home when her phone rang. "Hello?"

"Christine, this is Stephen."

"Yes?" It doesn't sound like an emergency, she thought.

"What exactly have you two been doing? You and my cloak . . ."

"Why do you ask?"

"Wong accidentally inhaled part of a dumpling when my cloak . . ."

"Levi . . ."

"What?"

"Call your cloak by its name. It's Levi." Christine could hear him sigh in exasperation in her ear. It was like he was right there.

"Ok . . . Levi floats in and gives him the Heimlech maneuver until food comes flying out of his mouth."

"How is Wong?"

"He's perfectly fine. I've also noticed it's writing down recipes and flipping through an anatomy book. I just want to know what is going on."

"You haven't asked Levi?"

"It just floats off."

"I taught Levi some first aid and now it's interested in learning more about modern medicine."

"Is it trying to become a doctor?"

"I think it's trying to keep you alive. For some reason, that appears to be very hard."

"Hmph."

"You should be glad I'm taking the time to teach Levi."

"I am touched . . . by the both of you," said Stephen. "I just don't know why it didn't come to me first for lessons." He actually sounded a little hurt.

"Oh, Stephen, you barely have enough patience to tolerate other surgeons. How are you going to have patience for a complete newbie? Especially one that you just now grasped has a name."

"Fine, whatever, though I do not want to be the crash test dummy for any type of surgery."

"I don't think it'll get that far. What kind of recipes is Levi writing down?"

"Looks like scar reduction and pain relief. Anyway, I was wondering if you'd like to go out for dinner this week. It doesn't appear we'll be invaded by the forces of darkness any time soon and I've been wanting to see you face. It's been too long."

"It depends on if you'll be wearing your magician's costume or a suit." Christine heard him sigh again in her ear. 

"I'll wear a tux."

The End

**Author's Note:**

> I got my medical information from:
> 
> http://cpr.heart.org/idc/groups/heart-public/@wcm/@ecc/documents/downloadable/ucm_487598.pdf American Heart Association about compression only CPR
> 
> https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/000047.htm Heimlich maneuver
> 
> I also had a CPR training session years ago so I'm drawing on memory. That said, please take one yourself rather than depend on anything written here.


End file.
